The 2fort Kids
by Joywing
Summary: All of us lived normal lives. We went to school, we did homework, and we kicked ass on Team Fortress 2 on weekends. That all changed one Saturday. Now we're stuck in a place I can only describe as 'in' the game. Except we aren't.
1. Prologue: Night of the Incident

The 2fort kids

Prologue: Night of the incident

"Going to cap in 3…2…1..."

"Hold it Jester, save it for when they come out of spawn, it'll be easier to kill them."

"Oh screw you Soul, I'm capping anyway!"

"You know, he has a point, I don't have full charge yet and those crits could mean life or death..."

"CAP IT NOW GODDAMMIT! THEY JUST CAME UP WITH AN OCTOHEAVY!"

"Ok, ok, ok!"

I sighed in relief as I watched my friends' weapons started glowing with crit energy and they blasted the enemy heavy to bits on-screen. 'That should buy us some time.' I thought as I went around healing my teammates.

Fray wasn't looking in too good shape, probably from standing right in front of the deadly heavy so he could aim the rocket that ended his life. Gold was busy attending to the sentry gun and dispenser which he had set up. He muttered a "thanks" over the Skype call after I overhealed him and continued with his job. Ray was hiding just behind the wall, waiting for an unlucky victim to fall into his sticky trap. Unfortunately for him, his bombs kept getting knocked back, but at least the unlucky pyro which tried that ate some pills and exploded.

"Yeah! Eat those 'nades ya twit!" He yelled over the mic. He did take some damage by accident though. Cry, however, was doing a better job of airblasting those pesky projectiles. I nearly got sent to respawn by a stray grenade but he knocked it back into an enemy scout, causing even more death.

"Wow Cry! I've never seen you airblast this well before!" I commented.

"Yeah, well I've been practicing." He replied.

Checking the meter on my screen, I could see that I had an ubercharge ready- and not a moment too soon.

"Joy! Charge it now!" My little brother pretty much begged over the call. With a simple 'ok' I hit the charge and watch him tear 3 soldiers, 2 heavies and a medic into Swiss cheese.

"I am bulletproof!" he quoted. Cue the teasing of my friends to my chagrin. Just the standard 2fort spawn camping procedure. As I was busy keeping the spawn campers alive, a stray scout which downed some Bonk and phased past us, whether we had airblasts or not. He did the usual thing and jumped onto the roof. Too bad he was running straight. He let out a scream of agony as a sniper bullet entered his skull and blew his brains out.

"Take that you annoying son of a gun!" ApekFreak exclaimed. He didn't get many kills as all of the spawn campers were hoarding them.

"You know, you could just swap to the huntsman and tag along the spawncampers right?" Soul said to him

"But I'm crap with a bow and arrow."

"If you insist."

"Going to go cap the last one ok guys?" Jester ran past the people at enemy spawn, stealing a kill from Soul in the process. Some arguing ensued.

"That was my kill! I've been camping enemy spawn for the past 15 minutes waiting for a guy to backstab and you go and steal it!"

"Yeah well, I got that kill! 'Cuz you suck!" He proceeded to run into the enemy Intel Room and grabbed the intelligence. He ran back to base, while everyone was holding down enemy spawn. (Except for Freak, he was camping friendly battlements because he's a pussy)

"Alright everyone to victory in 3…" Fray and Ray reloaded their weapons.

"2…" Gold got out his wrangler and pointed his sentry at enemy base.

"1…" I prepped an Ubercharge, preparing to use it on Dusk, my brother. He revved his minigun. I smiled.

And then everything on screen went black.


	2. Chapter 1: What the Hell is going on?

Disclaimer: I do not own Team Fortress 2 (it belongs to Valve)

Chapter 1: What the hell is going on?

"What the heck!?"

"You got this too?!"

"Joy are you ok?"

We were all dumbfounded by this incident. 'Did stop working again?' I thought. We were on possibly our best round of 2fort ever, and then this happens. At that point, I felt like punching the table. However, the weirdest was yet to come. A message appeared on my computer out of the blue. It read 'Do you like TF2?' with a text box for what I presume to be where to enter the answer.

"Hey guys, a message appeared on-screen. Did this happen to you too?" I asked. However, I received no answer. 'Skype call must've crashed.' I thought. I got up and went to my brother's room, hoping to ask him if anything happened on his side. Strangely, the door was locked. 'This definitely isn't normal.' I thought. My little brother never locks his door, since he always forgets.

"Looks like I'll have to answer the question to find out." I muttered. I went back to my desktop and looked at the question. I typed in 'Yes, I do. TF2 is my favourite game.' The question disappeared and got replaced by another. This time it read: 'How long have you been playing?' I did the math and entered 'Been playing for 9 months if you count this month.' 'Are they interviewing me or something?' I thought. Then another appeared: 'What is your favourite class?' 'Yes, yes they are.' I answered mentally, entering 'Medic' and continuing.

The next question was the last, and probably the most out of place: 'What other abilities do you have? (Include only the ones applied in your imagination)' my first reaction was to comment "What's a question like this doing in a quiz about TF2?" However, I answered the other questions, so I went ahead and thought about it.

I scrolled through the other video games I played until I came across something. I considered it fitting, and entered it in. The moment I hit 'enter' my vision started getting dark. I only had time to think 'what the hell?!' before collapsing on my desktop.

The first thing I registered when I woke up is that I have been moved. This was not the desktop where I got knocked out. I got up, and surveyed my surroundings. It appears that I was in a 'classroom' of sorts. I could see several desks with papers on them. I could also see several other kids, who were separated in glass cubicles like the one I was in. Some were just waking up and others were just looking around. They look just as confused as I was. I called out to the boy next to me, a lad of 14 I think, and he responded. However, none of us could hear the others' voice, probably because the area was soundproof. As, I saw the other kids wake up, I wondered, 'Could we all have been kidnapped? Could this be some guy's sick joke? Is Dusk ok?' Those were just some of the millions of questions going through my head.

Suddenly, an announcement over an unseen intercom boomed, "All potential recruits, please proceed to the seat in front of you and complete the test." 'Recruits? Is that us?' Seeing as there was no way out of the area, I went ahead with the announcement, after all that was the only authority figure I've seen (Sorry, heard) since arriving. I went over to the seat, grabbed the pens on the table and started working. 'This is a weird day.' I thought, thinking of what sort of crazy questions would be inside.

The test was mostly a medical paper, partially to my surprise. Although they did slip a few interesting questions inside. Like asking us to theorise how the medigun works. I was extremely thankful to my imagination during the test, as I had already figured out most of the 'interesting' questions before. And I had researched most of the medical stuff. Even if this is all a dream, may as well grab the satisfaction of doing well before leaving right?

I went ahead and kept checking my work over and over, until I felt a tremor which threw my train of thought off. Angrily, I turned and looked for the offender. I was shocked to see the boy, once the first person I saw in this crazy place, was now a mess of body parts and blood.

Through the glass wall, I saw the bloody mess which used to be a human being, a charred and broken plastic scrap which might've been a table, and a small black metal scrap in the middle of it all, the device which ended his life. 'They're going to kill us!' I thought after recovering from the shock. Is this what they did to Dusk? To my friends? I stared at my finished test paper as if it was going to explode. For all I knew, it could've.

"Pens down. The test is over." I put my pen down and watched the others do the same. I kept thinking of that boy as the test papers disappeared, collected by an unseen force. 'What do they want from us?' I thought. I couldn't dwell on it for very long because I was knocked unconscious a second time.

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Thanks for taking the time to read the story. Review if you can (constructive criticism is greatly appreciated) and keep reading if you're interested. ( A chapter will be up once a week or more often depending on school workload.) This is Joywing signing off.


	3. Chapter 2: Welcome to 2fort

Chapter 2: Welcome to 2fort

When I woke up for the second time that theoretical week, (I don't know how long I was knocked out) the first thing I noticed was that my sight had changed. I now had a heads-up display (The same one as in TF2) in front of my vision. I tried waving my now-gloved hand in front of it- no effect. 'Great, did some psycho perform eye surgery on me?' was my first thought. Wait. Gloved hands? I immediately got up and looked down. My clothes had changed. Instead of the light blue shorts and yellow T-shirt I was wearing when I collapsed, I was now wearing a lab coat on top of a shirt, a pair of brown cargo pants and boots- just like the RED medic's uniform. "Jesus Christ, what the hell happened?" I muttered. After that fiasco, I examined the place where I was moved to. It appeared to be an elevator, with a blanket in the centre where I was tucked underneath.

For the next 30 minutes or so, I looked around the elevator. It was made mostly of glass-no surprises there. I then looked at the elevator buttons, since it would be good to have an idea of where I was going. The labels read B2 to 2 in terms of floor level. I also noticed that there was no first floor. That wasn't the odd part though. What was odd was the labels for the floors. Here's what the buttons read: 'B2- Recruit living quarters, B1- Administration, 2-2fort Spawn Room (RED).' The button for the second floor was already pressed.

"At least I know where I am now." I muttered to myself. I kept thinking back to that boy in the classroom. 'Are we all going to be killed? One by one like that boy?' I dwelled on the grim thought of death, worrying about my friends, my family, and basically everybody I knew. After what seemed like an eternity, a soft 'ding' sounded and the metal doors parted. I took a deep breath and walked out.

I didn't recognise this section of the map, to my shock. It was just a white room, with a box in the corner next to the door out. I did the obvious thing and went to check the box. 'This could still be a trick, don't lose your head.' I thought to myself as I walked over. It was white in colour, with the Red Cross symbol painted on the side. I opened the box, and was surprised to find weapons inside. To be specific, a crossbow that looked uncannily similar to the one I used in-game, and an ubersaw. My preferred weapons. 'I'll need these if they work.' I thought. I took out the crossbow first.

"Pfft. This thing probably can't fire." I pulled the trigger and to my surprise (for the tenth or so time), it did. I went over to the fired projectile and examined it. A syringe- just like the game. Brushing that off for the moment, I reloaded the crossbow, mimicking the reload animation I had seen so many times. Although there was one thing I found strange- there was no medigun. I mean, given that it was the signature weapon, surely it would be among the pile right? I thought for a moment. 'Could they have removed it? No, if they did, they wouldn't give me a crossbow that can fire. But then, where is it?'

I thought for a moment and then I realised it- it wasn't in the pile because it couldn't be in the pile. I reached behind my back and sure enough, I felt the metal handle of the medigun. I gave it a sharp yank and took a look- it was normal, if you didn't count that the silver head of a robotic heavy was attached with red and yellow wires. There was also an orange counter on the side, with the exact number I had on the one I used in-game. Weird. Seeing nothing else that needed to be done- since I couldn't test the other weapons without another person there, I continued through the door.

You have no idea how relieved I was when I heard a familiar voice call out, "Hey Joy! Didn't think you'd be here!"

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Thanks for reading guys! Really appreciate it. By the way, since its National Day here in Singapore (Happy National Day to Singaporeans reading this and yes, this year's NDP song sucks on ice) I'm going to upload two chapters. Again thanks for reading, review if you can and all constructive criticism is greatly appreciated.


	4. Chapter 3: Reunion

Chapter 3: Reunion

I was then tackled by a red blur and got knocked down.

"Sorry! Still can't get used to the speed!" I got up and adjusted my glasses- turns out that the red blur was in fact Jester. (I know this for sure since the heads-up display showed his name when I looked at him) He was dressed in a red T-shirt and shorts and was wearing a cap and headset- the RED scout's uniform.

"It's great to see you too. By the way, what the heck happened that night? One moment we're wrecking stuff on 2fort, next we're actually there!" I exclaimed.

"Yeah well, I'm not so sure what happened either. Anyway, I should probably tell everyone else that you're here. Hey! Guys!" He went outside the spawn door, and seeing nothing else that needed doing, I tagged along. Let's just say, that I was surprised for the hundredth or so time that day. I saw Fray, dressed in a helmet that covered his eyes, a red coloured 'jacket' (I can't describe it) and a pair of cargo pants and boots. He was limping, wincing in pain as he dragged his blood-stained legs to the spawn room.

"Hey Joy! Just wait a moment, I need to repair my feet. You know what rocket jumping causes." He said to me with a smile. He walked (sorry, limped) over to the cabinet I recognised as the resupply closet and touched it. Instantaneously, his legs got repaired and he looked a lot better. 'Another thing I don't get' I thought.

Next, I saw Ray (who was dressed in some sort of blast-proof gear on top of…pyjamas? I don't know) who was having trouble standing straight. His legs were battered and bloody like Fray's. He proceeded to vomit up what I'm assuming to be his lunch and collapse. Fray went over and hauled him into the spawn room. 'Might be a good time to test if this works.' I thought, pulling out the medigun and walking over. I pointed it at the fainted Ray and pushed the lever. A red healing beam came from the gun and latched on to Ray, repairing his legs and fixing whatever caused him to collapse.

"Wait what?" he said as he woke up. He saw me and said "Oh, thanks Joy!" and got into a sitting position. Last to arrive was Gold, who was wearing a hardhat and goggles. He was dressed in a red shirt and overalls, which were covered in motor grease. (Was probably tinkering with something. Seriously, who wouldn't?) He was rubbing his back as he walked into the spawn room.

"Jester, this better not be a trick again. You've Called Wolf about 5 times in the past hour." He commented, slightly angrily.

"No really, Joy's here. See?" Jester said pointing to me. I simply said "Hi. And now, could you guys tell me what happened to you that night? I swear I've spent half the time trying to figure out what the heck is going on and the other half worrying about you guys." 'And the other half, worrying about the psycho that's going to kill us.' Thankfully, we complied our info and we could figure out what happened. Apparently, their screens went black too, hence all of the cussing during the incident.

"It was during one of the best runs I've had in history too." Fray commented. All of us nodded in agreement. After the screens went black, they too received a message on screen, and they couldn't hear anything on the Skype call either. We discussed the questions- they got the exact same questions. 'Could this have been arranged?' the thought crossed my mind. Everything- from the message to the test-it all seemed like this was routine. It was very possible that someone could be pulling the strings. But, my friends looked like they were having fun, even though they could have been kidnapped or killed. I didn't want to ruin it for them, so I pushed the thought to the back of my mind.

In other words, they went through the same as I did. Except that they received different tests. Gold got some sort of math and physics test, (again, with 'interesting' questions slipped in) Fray was asked to wrestle with snakes, ("I thought it was a dream. So I went with it" he commented) Jester was of the very few who were left standing after downing about 10 cans of soda (most of the kids collapsed from the sugar rush) and Ray was lucky enough to figure out how to defuse a pack of C4 ("You know, like in the movies. Cut the green wire, avoid the red one." He described it.)

"I assume we can expect to see the others show up right?" I asked.

"Probably. I can see Cry, ApekFreak, Soul and Dusk showing up given that four of us are already here." Answered Gold.

"Well, while waiting, why not have some fun? I mean, you don't get sent to 2fort every day." Jester suggested. 'That's actually a pretty good idea.' I thought. 'Ok. This is the chance to figure stuff out. Figure out if this is real.' I stepped on the sniper battlements and walked to the edge. 'Come at me logic!' I thought as I jumped off the 2nd floor of the building.

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For the tenth time,(exaggerated) thanks for taking the time to read what I've written. Please review if you can (constructive criticism is appreciated) and if you enjoyed it, feel free to favourite. Once again, thanks for reading guys!


	5. Chapter 4: Messing around

Chapter 4: Messing around

*CRUNCH*

"OH GOD F***ING DAMMIT! THIS BLOODY HURTS!" I yelled. I felt as if my legs were on fire, not unlike that time I got hit by a car. 'Broken bones probably.' I thought through the pain. "How those mercs in-game took this pain in silence I will never know." I mumbled. Strangely, I felt the pain slowly numb and fade away, as if my legs were fixing themselves. Looking at the heads-up display, I could see what happened-health regeneration. (My health bar dropped down a bit from the damage and slowly increased again)

'Well, I guess this is proof, I really did get sent to 2fort with my friends.' I concluded. I then decided to well, have fun, as Jester had suggested. First thing on my to-do list: airshot a rocket jumping Fray. With a syringe that has potentially harmful contents. It took a bit of convincing, (considering the pain of rocket jumping, I can understand) but I managed to do so. "You sure this will work Joy?" he asked. I simply said, "I have no idea!" He pointed the rocket launcher at his feet and fired anyway. I aimed the crossbow at where he was going to land and fired, hitting a screaming 13-year old. Cue complaints of a syringe in the back and a sadistic laugh.

Next on my list: ubercharge a bonked Jester. This test went a bit weird. I managed to get the charge easily by whacking the dummies in the spawn room. (Proving that my ubersaw works) I then tracked down my friend and asked him to down the radioactive drink. He obliged.

"Alright. Charging in 3…2…1!" I hit the button near the medigun handle and waited, expecting the charge. Surprisingly, neither Jester nor I was shielded in the red-coloured shell that signalled an ubercharge.

"W-w-what's going on? W-w-why aren't I charged?" Hey said, barely getting the words out through the insane amounts of caffeine. I could only respond "I don't know." Shrugging, Jester ran off, possibly to burn off all of the extra energy. This left me with a dilemma (obviously). Given that we were all given these weapons and abilities, we will most likely be expected to fight. Thus, not being able to ubercharge posed a huge problem. Then it hit me. And I facepalmed while cussing.

'I'm going to have to perform an uber heart transplant on nine people including myself. Damn it.' I cursed. Seeing as there was nothing else that needed doing, I went back to the elevator and went to explore the 'Recruit living quarters'. I mean, if 'Recruits' refer to us, I figure that we have the right to explore where we're going to live right? I hit the button and waited in the elevator.

After what could've either been an eternity or 3 minutes, a soft 'ding' sounded. I stepped out to see a small living room, with a simple television set, a wooden coffee table and some red sofas around. The place was lit by a simple ceiling lamp. Looking around, I could see two paths from the living room, one leading to the left into a room with a stove, an oven, a fridge and other cooking appliances, the other leading to a corridor. Curious, I headed down the corridor. (Not before grabbing some fruit juice from the fridge, I mean, I didn't have anything to drink since I arrived there)

The corridor had nine doors total, arranged on either side, evenly spaced apart. Each door had one of the TF2 classes' symbols on it. 'Don't want to intrude on everybody else's rooms.' I thought walking down the corridor. After about a minute of walking, I reached my room. (Or at least I assumed it was) I did the obvious and went inside. I could see standard furniture- a bed, a closet and a desk. The rest of the room was mostly empty. The only interesting part of the room was a slightly smaller sub-room in the back with a door. Again, curiosity made me go and open the door.

"This is really cool," Was all I could say. The sub-room was a simple infirmary/ operating room but I didn't care. Never saw one before let alone had the opportunity to use one, so this was fantastic to me. After a bit of excited jumping, I calmed myself down. 'Look Joy, you've got work to do here. First, track supplies.' I went around, looking through cabinets, drawers, and checked the operating area. Apparently, the last owner had no idea what he/she was doing. All I could find was scalpels, the ubercharge device (nine of them) a bonesaw (which I swear is too big to do anything but hurt people) and several other implements which I do not think are suitable to use in an operation (I mean it. I found a fire axe in one of the tool cabinets.) No pain killer, no stabiliser, not even an ultrasound.

"Looks like a 'little to no regard for care of the patient' is biting me in the bum now." I said to myself. While I was busy mulling over how to get out of this predicament, I didn't hear a certain 10-year old sneak up behind me and tap me in the back.

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Hey guys! Thanks again for reading the story I have here! Fell ill with a cold a few days back so, that would explain why this chapter's a bit late, but better late than never right? Anyway, please review if you can and I'll upload the next chapter in a week. Joywing out.


	6. Chapter 5: Meet the little brother

Chapter 5: Meet the little brother

Jumping, my ubersaw flew to my hand, as I turned around to see who did that, expecting an enemy. All I saw was my little brother, quivering in fear at the weapon in my hand. Honestly, the sight of him was actually quite amusing. He was dressed in a bullet-proof suit on top of a red shirt, and he was wearing a pair of cargo pants held up by a belt and a pair of boots, as well as a bandolier that was obviously too big for him.

"H-h-hi Joy." He stammered. Realising that he was not going to hurt me, I put away the saw and responded "Hey Dusk. How'd you get here? I thought I was the only one here."

"Followed you from the elevator, you probably didn't see me. Anyway, can you tell me what happened? I was really worried that night." He replied, tears forming in his eyes upon recalling home. I felt that being just as involved in the incident as I was, he deserved to know what happened. I told him what had transpired, from the night of the incident to the 'testing', only omitting the part with the exploding boy. (He's too sensitive for that. I don't want to make him scared.)

"So we're stuck here?" He asked. I nodded. Tears brimmed in his dark brown eyes and he started crying. I didn't know what to do. I couldn't comfort him like my mum can (he looks up to her as if she were God) and I don't exactly have the best social skills in the world, so I was stuck. Settling for the next best thing, I reached into the nearby fridge and pulled out the first edible thing I saw- a sandwich (sandvich for those of you being picky) and handed it to Dusk. As he nibbled on the food in between sniffs, I tried my best to make him feel better. (Which I doubted I could manage. My words were a poor substitute for the usual counselling he gets from his mother)

"Could be a lot worse Dusk. Since we're here, why not have fun? I mean, you told me that you wanted to use a minigun right?" I asked, pointing to the large gun that he carried in with him. (Still don't know how he carried a gun nearly as big as he was, and nearly three times his weight) He nodded and I continued. "Plus, if we really are in a game, there's nothing to fear." I patted him on the back. Seeing that his crying was reduced to sniffles, (Or at least was reduced in intensity) I directed him to the bathroom to wash his face. He still insisted on me standing guard at the door, 'to warn him of bad guys' as he said. Afterwards, we went back up to the spawn room, where I called the others.

"Looks like Dusk's here," said Ray walking in. He looked noticeably better than he did earlier. Fray knocked into the wall while stating "Yeah, here comes the ear pain." Jester and Gold walked in after him, both looking pretty beat-up.

"Oh great Dusk's here. Hey Joy, mind sewing up his mouth for us? Would save time on performing ear surgery." Quipped Gold. Everyone laughed with the exception of me, who was telling Dusk to ignore them, and Dusk himself, who was tearing up at their words. (They were right to a certain extent but making fun of him? Really?)

"Would you mind your comments please? He's already depressed about leaving home." They shut up afterwards. Moving on, I went over to Jester and Gold. Seeing their wounds I had to ask, "How'd you get injured? I'd think that you guys had enough common sense to not injure yourselves."

Jester broke into a grin recalling the incident and exclaimed excitedly, "Leonardo Da Vinci appeared and he called Gold's sentry stupid which offended him so I killed him! But then there was a sapper on his sentry which exploded and injured both of us!" I took out my medigun and healed them, nodding as if to believe their story. (Which I don't. Seriously, how can Leonardo Da Vinci appear in the 21st century? Let alone sap Gold's sentry?)

Feeling exhausted from the day of exploration, I headed back down to the 'Living Quarters' and grabbed some rest.

Unfortunately, upon arriving back in my room/ infirmary, all of my problems slapped me in the face. I still needed to perform those uber heart transplants, not to mention more worries about my parents and school. Even the boy from the explosion decided to pay a visit.

In a nutshell, let's just say I didn't sleep very well.

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Hey guys, thanks for taking the time to read this far! It's really encouraging that there are people out there who enjoy what I'm doing here. Although, the exams are coming soon, so you guys will have to settle for one chapter a week. (I'm sorry though, I'll try and upload more often post-exams.) Anyway, thanks again for taking the time to read my story, review if you can, and I'll see you guys next week.


	7. Chapter 6: Reminder: We are Screwed

Chapter 6: Reminder: We are screwed

"ARRRGH!" screamed Ray as a bullet went through his skull. Jester died, his body going up in flames. Fray turned into a mess of blood, limbs and organs as he ate a grenade to the face and exploded. Gold was shot to bits by a sentry unseen by him. All of my friends, died horrible deaths, still screaming for help.

But I couldn't help them.

It was then down to my brother and I. Desperately, I used the medigun on him, in attempt to escape. Alas, we got cornered by our BLU counterparts

"Joy! Look out!" Those were the last words from my brother, as he shoved me to the side, eating the stream of bullets from the enemy's gun. I looked behind me- I saw the emotionless face of the BLU spy, his revolver aimed at me. And behind him I saw the ghost of that boy from the explosion, mouthing the words, "This is your fate. There is no escape."

I woke up scrambling out of bed, screaming and swinging a pen that happened to be on the desk nearby, as if the BLU spy, the ghost of the boy, was all real.

"Whoa! What happened there Joy?" an unseen yet familiar voice asked. I looked around, not understanding where the voice came from. I then saw a figure slowly materialise out of thin air. It was not the BLU spy from the dream, but our own spy, Soul. He was almost unrecognisable in the cotton suit and balaclava he was wearing.

Immediately, I put down the pen and answered "Nothing Soul. Just a bad dream." I rubbed my head as if that nightmare gave me a headache. (It didn't, but what it did do was remind me of the depressing situation) I continued, shoving the stressful thoughts to the back of my mind, "Why are you here though? There's plenty of stuff to do." 'Not to mention that we're miles from home, we are most likely going to be killed and that there's nothing we can do about it.' Soul shrugged.

"Came in after you went to bed. Everybody else was going to turn in too. I just followed suit. I wake up nice and early and then I hear commotion from here." Oh. Right. His room was right next to mine. We then discussed what happened, the incident, the 'test' etc. Apparently, Soul saw something slip, something suspicious, because he asked me, "That can't be it. Joy what really happened?" No wriggling out of this one. My attempt to murder him with a pen on the pretence that he was an imaginary enemy spy was solid evidence of that. Sighing, I explained everything, the boy that got killed, and the fact that we could be miles from home, basically almost everything that was worrying me.

"We're stuck in what could possibly be another dimension, with no way home, and we could be dead in less than a second. I'm actually surprised that you guys aren't scared."

"I don't know about the others, but I'm actually pretty terrified." He stated. Turns out, he was about as worried (if not, more so) as I was. Looks like at least one of my friends figured it out. He went off to the 'living room' and left me to get my bearings. I went to make my bed, (no parents to help you this time) put on my 'uniform' and glasses (Changed into some PJs which were in the closet before bed), and followed.

Almost instantly, things went to hell. Everyone (except Ray who was missing from the table) was staring angrily at Soul, including ApekFreak, who must have come with Soul while I was asleep. I could smell burning food from the kitchen. Confused as to what happened, I went to settle what was in the kitchen first. Two words: Culinary disaster.

I saw a charred and blackened piece of bacon on the stove, the debris left from what I assume is an explosion, and a sandwich that was about to topple. In the centre of it all, I saw Ray covered in food remains. Immediately, I went to rescue the bacon and sandwich, switching off the stove and rearranging the poor sandwich into a more acceptable position. Next I took Ray aside and asked him "What the heck did you do here?!" He smiled and responded,

"Trying to make breakfast. I was elected to do this." I facepalmed and got him to help clean up. I sent him back to the 'living room' while I made something for them to eat. 'These guys are hopeless' I thought. I slapped together some ham and cheese sandwiches- I was in too much of a hurry to make anything else.

"Ok guys, breakfast is read-. What are you doing?" I stopped my announcement mid-sentence. Why? Soul was currently being used as a piñata. More specifically, Dusk was standing on a chair and holding Soul by the legs while everyone glared angrily at him, as if picking out an effective method of torture. Soul was the first to speak up. "Err, Joy? Could you tell them to put me down? Please?" he said, fear in his voice. Jester slapped him in the face and then responded, "The little sneak went and pranked us!" This evolved into yet another argument. It was normal, really.

"I was just testing out the invis-watch! You'd do it too right?" protested Soul.

"That didn't mean that you had to prop up a jar of piss on top of my door!" yelled ApekFreak angrily. Cue complaints of more of Soul's 'pranks'. A faulty sentry blowing Gold out his bedroom door, a frying pan placed ever-so carefully on top of Ray's bed stand so when he got up he'd hit his face into it, a string tied to a cap which caused an anvil to fall. (Lucky he was so fast, he'd be dealing with a concussion otherwise.)

At this point, I put the sandwiches on the table and grabbed one of them myself. Things are going to get messy and I didn't want a part in it. May as well grab a bit of a laugh while this is happening right? (Plus, I saw this as a kind of 'compensation' for that nightmare earlier.)

"At least I didn't kill anybody!" Soul yelled. Silence. 'God damn it Soul!' I thought. I'd think that he'd have enough common sense to not mention events that would cause more problems. My friends looked at Soul in apprehension, as if to say, "What the hell are you talking about?" Jester was the first to recover. He proceeded to tell Soul, "Another one of your jokes again? Seriously, no one's going to kill anybody. We aren't going to die. This is most likely all bullshit that you made up to get out of trouble." (Funny, he looked like he was trying to convince himself as much as everyone else.)

Soul shook his head, exclaiming, "It's true! A boy got killed during testing! Ask Joy!" The apprehensive gaze of my friends now turned to me. Suddenly, the sandwich I was eating didn't seem that tasty.

"Joy? What exactly happened?" Gold asked, with some fear in his voice. Again, there was no escaping this one. I had to spill the beans. If I didn't, Soul would, and I didn't trust him to give an unbiased view of the situation. (He'd make the situation worse I'd bet) Sighing, I told them about the boy who died in the explosion. Afterwards, I swear the temperature in the room dropped several degrees. (Dusk even ran off afterwards. I heard sobbing.)

Mental note: Punish Soul for using depression and fear as a means to escape punishment.

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Again, thanks guys for the constructive criticism and for reading my story. (That update yesterday was just a minor change by the way, WYK is now Fray) And, in advance, I would like to apologise for bad writing in this chapter. I had some difficulty writing it and it isn't exactly my best work. Still, review if you can (Constructive criticism is always appreciated) and I'll see you guys next week!


	8. Chapter 7: Paranoid fight

Chapter 7: 10-minute Fight

Everyone (with the exception of Dusk and Freak) ate their breakfast in silence. The news seriously put a damper on the mood. (Heck, even I felt a little depressed.) Even Jester and Fray, who would usually talk our ears off for being like this, remained silent. After I finished eating my sandwich, (I was first to finish since I had a head-start) I got some water and dumped it on Freak, waking him up. (He fainted after listening to the news. Yeah, he does it so often that me and Dusk are the only people who actually bother doing that anymore.) I then called, "Last one to finish cleans up the plates." And went to Dusk's room.

I knocked on the door-no answer. Through the door I could hear sobbing. I decided to let myself in anyway- he's not going to stop crying anytime soon. The room looked quite similar to mine. Same closet, desk and bed, except that on the bed, Dusk was curled up and crying. Walking over I asked, "What's wrong Dusk?" Sniffling, he responded, "T-that kid, h-he died coming here d-didn't he? W-what about us? A-are w-we going to d-die too?" The thought about death caused him to cry even harder. I sat there with him for a moment, searching for words to comfort him.

"Don't be silly Dusk. Respawn will make sure we don't die." (I felt horrible for lying to him, but I couldn't leave him to cry like that. Seeing him depressed made me feel worse.)

"R-really?" I nodded and continued, "Besides, it's not like we'll use it anyway. Anyway, cheer up and follow me. I have an idea." He was tearing in joy a little, but listened, curious as to what my 'idea' was. I gestured for him to follow and I went up to the battlements. 'Hope that this doesn't make more problems' I thought as we waited in the elevator.

We went over to the sniper deck, where Freak was trying out his sniper rifle. On the bridge's roof, I could see Gold standing on it with an apple on his head. (How'd he get there? Sentry jump?) Perfect opportunity for the 'idea'.

"Shhh." I told Dusk. Quietly taking out my crossbow, I hid, crouching, with Dusk behind a corner. I took my aim- the centre portion of his vest. I fired. The glittering red syringe flew through the air, hitting its mark. The effect was almost instant-Freak jumped about 2 meters in the air and grabbed the ceiling.

"GAACK! Who's there?! Who shot me?!" He yelled, still gripping on to the ceiling with his fingernails. Dusk, Gold, and I started laughing like crazy- we all knew he was a pussy, but to start panicking upon being shot by a syringe? Seriously? Gold even laughed so hard that he fell in the sewer water under the bridge. Angrily, Freak asked, "Really, Joy? Really?" Turning his head to the side, so as to look at a corner, he yelled "I bet Soul put you up to this didn't he? Come on out, I know you're there!"

Said person then materialised out of thin air. Soul, who was bent double from laughing, replied "I didn't ask Joy to do it. But this... is too funny. Seriously, I didn't even know you could jump this high." Wiping the tears from my eyes, I answered, "Yeah, I had to. Anyway, you'd better get down from there, can't have our sniper adhered to the ceiling can we?" He shook his head.

"I think falling from this height will hurt me." This sparked a four-way argument about whether dropping 2 meters from the ceiling would hurt.

"Seriously man, if jumping off the 2nd floor of our base will only cause 10 damage, dropping from the ceiling will be fine!"

"But, I read about this one guy, he broke both his legs dropping from this height!"

"It's fine if you believe that, but if you get hurt I can heal you! Is it really that difficult to let go of the ceiling?!" This continued until Dusk, who was extremely pissed off at the ridiculousness of both Freak and the argument, (I can understand. If he didn't do it first, I would've.) stormed over, stood on the box Freak was using as a table, and pulled him off the ceiling and dropped him on the ground with a thud.

"Hey! I could've gotten hurt you know! You little…" Freak responded.

"Hey watch what you say to him buster! You're the one who insisted on gripping on to a ceiling instead of just dropping down! In fact I think you should be thanking him!" I said to him, in defence of Dusk (Ok so maybe nobody was right, but there's such thing as an 'obligation') Freak then proceeded to shove me. Dusk did not take this kindly. What followed was chaos.

He shoved Freak back and Soul decided to egg Freak on. Said person then socked my little brother in the face. I then retaliated, (again, it's an obligation) and kicked him in the shin. Afterwards… let's say the entire team got locked in melee.

The fight spread to the courtyard, a result of Freak's attempts to run away, which was noticed by Fray and Ray who were there at the time. I don't know what went on in Fray's head, him being the crazy person he is, but he decided that jumping into the fight would be a good idea. Screaming an unintelligible cry, he threw himself into the storm of limbs, weapons and violence.

"You freaking idiot!" Ray called to him. Seeing no response, Ray joined the brawl, so as to make sure he didn't do anything even more stupid. Gold, (who had just gotten out of the sewers) was heading to the living area so as to wash off the sewer water. Too bad for him, since he got dragged into the fight through the crossfire.

"Ugh! What the hell man!? I just got out of the freaking sewers and I get involved in this?!" he yelled. Apparently, we must've had made such a huge ruckus (no kidding, I bet that even the BLU members could've heard us) that Jester could hear us through his headset. He went up to the courtyard asking, "What the heck is going on?!" Then he saw pretty much everyone fighting. (Except Freak, he was still trying to run away, the coward) He grinned, took out his bat, and jumped in. (Not sure if it's to defend me and Gold or to have fun.)

Through all of the flying blood, metal, and questionable language, we didn't notice someone arrive. Said person took out his flamethrower, waded into the fight and knocked all of us away.

"Looks like Cry's finally here." A dazed Gold mentioned.

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Again, I'd like to thank you guys for reading and providing criticism. It's really encouraging. Again, review if you can ( Constructive criticism is greatly appreciated), and I'll see you guys next week. ( By the way, this author's note was not copy-pasted. Do you really think I'm that lazy?)


	9. Chapter 8: Do You Believe in Reality?

Chapter 8: Do You Believe in Reality?

"Jsus Chrst! Wht hppend hr?" Cry said, his voice muffled by his gas mask. He was wearing a full-body asbestos suit and a gas mask. Fray, who had a black eye and several cuts smiled, revealing several missing teeth, sat up and said, "Had a fight. And it was awesome!" Ray, who had a solid knot on his head, continued the statement.

"No it was NOT awesome. I swear, I've gotten more hurt in the last 10 minutes than I have in my entire life." He stood up, looked around and said, "Now could someone direct me to the idiot who started this mess?" Fingers started pointing.

"Soul did it! I swear that little trickster is always causing trouble!"

"WHAT!? No way! It was ApekFreak! He was the one who decided to punch Dusk!"

"No, no! It was Dusk! If he didn't shove ApekFreak we wouldn't be here!"

"All f yo sht up!" Cry yelled. Everybody stopped the accusations. Cry walked over to me, Soul, Dusk, and ApekFreak, pulled off one of his rubber gloves (which revealed another glove underneath) and proceeded to slap all of us in the face with it. Then came the matter of fixing the numerous wounds everyone sustained. (Apparently, friendly fire doesn't stop you from getting hurt outside matches) Allow me to count the numerous wounds everyone got. Cuts, bruises, broken bones, missing teeth- I could go on all day. (It was miracle no one had died of blood loss yet) 'I am so freaking thankful that I have a medigun.' I thought as I used it on everybody.

Next on the agenda: Explaining everything. Needless to say, it didn't take very long. (We've done this several times already. Give us a break.) Cry's first reaction went along the lines of mumbling 'Ths cnt be hppnng.' Multiple times. After about five minutes of this, he airblasted ApekFreak over the edge of the building. (Talk about irony.) For kicks, I shot him with a syringe on his way down.

"Very funny Cry." ApekFreak muttered in his general direction, with a hint of anger. Unfortunately for him, Cry heard him. (Let's just say that we agreed to ban Cry from being let near matches afterwards.) Freak wasn't the last victim though- he went ahead and pissed off almost everyone there during his 'rampage of fury'. (Or at least I thought it was.)

I went to watch him for a while (I mean, given that he already hurt ApekFreak, some peeps are going to get injured.) He went up to Jester who was playing baseball by himself against a wall and talked to him. I was some distance away, so I couldn't hear too much of their conversation (Cry's gas mask muffling his words didn't help too much either) but from Jester's expression, it was probably going badly. Next thing I know, psycho Cry went and pulled out his flamethrower for a 'game' of fire tag. Thankfully, Jester managed to escape due to his high speed.

"Son of a-"he said mid-sentence when the flames erupted from Cry's gun. He called to the others, but I don't think they heard him. If they did, I wouldn't have had to deal with so many patients that day. I continued following him, and in hindsight, I should've warned the others, but I brushed off his first action as a personal vendetta. (He and Jester had a slight grudge after an incident during one of our game sessions.)

When I caught up with him, he was chatting with Fray and Ray. It was probably something about testing the airblast on projectiles, since Fray took out his rocket launcher and fired. Cue deliberate miss which sent the live explosive into a bottle on a nearby crate. It caused a cataclysmic fire to erupt- as if someone threw a Molotov. Watching the two burn up, Cry just laughed, revealing a bottle. He pulled off the label. He replaced the water in Ray's bottle with gasoline.

Getting where this was going, I went off to warn everyone else- first person I went to was Gold since he was nearest. He was chilling in the courtyard with his self-made sentry.

"Dude, Cry's on the loose. Might want to tweak that sentry A.I. or something."

Shrugging, he simply responded, "I knew that. I saw that fiery explosion from here." He pulled out his wrangler for good measure. Nodding, I went off to the Intelligence Room to try and find Dusk. (He likes the air conditioner in there) Apparently, I was too slow, because when I got there I saw both him and Soul on fire along with the culprit, who I swear is enjoying his sick revenge on everyone. I think he spotted me as well, and while he doesn't really have any matter which torching me would justify, he'd probably do it anyway.

"Cry, if you decide to burn me alive, I swear I will rip your pancreas out before I die from the burns." I took out a scalpel I had on me and aimed at his abdomen in case I'd have to actually carry out that threat. I don't know what sort of reasoning he had, but he backed off. (Maybe he finally cooled down by then) I pointed to the door and he left without another word. I went ahead and patched up the two burning kids and sent them to the infirmary for treatment along with the others which I went to go and find.

"CRY!" that was a pretty much universal call from the five injured people in the infirmary when said person came in to apologise. (Manic rushes of his don't really last very long).

"Srry abt brning you gys. I thht ths ws anther trck. I thht tht you gys wr jst tying with me. I thht tht…" Cry's speech was silenced when he saw the angry glares of the injured teenagers. They probably would've wanted to get revenge or the like after I healed them (I even saw Ray try and pick up his grenade launcher to blow Cry's face off but he winced from the burns on his hands and dropped it), but we got yet another announcement after so long.

"All successful recruits, please proceed to the Administration area on level B1."

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Again, thanks for reading what I've written and I would like to apologise if chapters go up late from now to the end of the exams (I know, I've mentioned this so many times already, but I simply can't keep uploading at one chapter a week right now.) Anyway, review if you can, constructive criticism is always welcome, and I'll see you guys whenever I can finish the next chapter.


	10. Chapter 9: Smoked Out

Chapter 9: Smoked out

To this, everyone reacted normally. To be more specific, most of us ignored the announcement. I mean, why should we listen? It could be a trap or something that could land us a one-way ticket to the afterlife. (Following those instructions killed that kid in the testing area) In fact, I'm fairly sure Dusk was the only one who paid those instructions any heed, him being raised to obey an adult at all times. (I think I might've listened, but during a life and death situation, I thought that following the rules took a backseat). He constantly badgered me to follow the announcement. Here's the chat we had in a nutshell (had to cut out about 5 minutes of whining):

"Hey, Joy, don't you think we should go down? We might get some idea…"

"No, Dusk."

"But, Why? I mean, Mum always told us, when you're lost, look for an adult. Surely, this qualifies as being lost…"

"Just no Dusk."

"You're not answering my question."

"We're not going and that is final. Clear?" Dusk tried to get up in defiance to head to the elevator, but he collapsed on the floor due to his burns. I just helped him up. Nothing else needed to be said.

From there, I just proceeded with patching up everyone's burns, thankfully only first to second degree, leaving Dusk to last. (He did have some burns which would justify a bit of earlier treatment, but I had to delay him leaving as much as possible.) It wasn't really that hard.

After healing Soul, (who only had minor burns for one reason or another- you'd think that getting torched in a suit that's entirely flammable would give you at least a third-degree burn) I started getting worried. Dusk was going to leave as soon as he could move, and that would potentially mean that he wouldn't be coming back. However, fate decided to be a jackass anyway.

"Hey, does anyone else smell something burning?" asked Fray.

"Oh, probably remnants of Cry's rampage." Ray responded.

"It can't be. This smells different." Gold countered. I stopped healing Dusk, and tried smelling the air. 'It's familiar. And I think that this smell is supposed to signal something dangerous or something. But what is it…' I thought. While I was mulling on that, I didn't see that Jester and Gold suddenly turned pale.

"Everybody get out! Now!" Jester yelled. Startled, I snapped back to reality. I called, "What's happening?" Jester just motioned for me to follow while saying, "Pesticide! Why it's here I don't know, but staying here is dangerous! I'd think you'd recognise it!" Ah. Right. So that's what it was. How did I not recognise it immediately? (Maybe stuff's just getting too crazy.) Finally getting an idea of what's going on, I grabbed a crossbow syringe from the ammo pocket at my belt and jabbed it into Dusk's arm. (We had to run, and I really needed to him to move. There simply wasn't enough time to finish healing him.)

"Ow!" he cried when I did so.

"Just eat the pain for now Dusk. You'll thank me later." I called back. I helped him on his feet and got him to move towards the others. We met up with them at the entrance of the elevator. While I'd normally question the effectiveness of going into an elevator of all places in a 'gas' attack, I didn't exactly have the time. Jester was jamming the 'up' button on the elevator while cussing. (Since when did elevators take so darn long to get down?) Thankfully, it was only another minute or two when the elevator arrived. Immediately, all of us ran into the area. Which was too small to hold all of us. (It wasn't designed to hold an entire team at once.)

"Hey! Get your hand out of my face!"

"I would if Fray could let my arm go!"

"Would be easier to get out of the way if Ray weren't blocking me!"

Yeah, we were stuck like sardines in there. We were squirming around pretty badly, so we ended up just squashing the elevator buttons, so all of them got pressed. And we got out on the first floor the elevator stopped on. (Well, we tumbled out more like. Cry and Soul got squashed at the bottom of the pile since they were the last to get in.) Which, just so happens to be the floor the announcement told us to go to. How about that?

Everyone started to complain of getting squashed. (No kidding) We squirmed about like worms, trying to get on our feet, some of us cursing in frustration. While we wriggled around trying to get to our feet, another voice on the intercom sounded- but it was different this time.

"Don't tell me this is the best we've got." The familiar-yet alien voice rasped.

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Hey guys, huge update today. Considering how I'll be MIA until October, here's something for you guys to read until I'm back. Again, I would like to thank all of you guys for reading my story, please review if you can, and I'll be back...I think. (Oh yeah, and Jester is now my co-writer. Give him some credit too. He's a huge help.)


	11. Chapter 10: The Truth

Chapter 10: The Truth

'Where did I hear that voice before?' I thought immediately. I racked my brain trying to find out the identity of the woman on the line. (Or it could be a man. I wasn't very sure.) I wasn't the only one puzzled though- I saw ApekFreak scratching the hair under his hat in apprehension. (I'm fairly sure others were confused, but it was hard to see them in the pile of bodies.)

"Get up you miserable excuse for a team." The voice ordered us. Well, the voice had a kind of authority to it, like if we didn't obey it immediately, we'd get liquefied. All of us scrambled to our feet. Now that my vision wasn't blocked by my friends, I could get a good look at the area we landed at. It was a dark room with computer units arranged like you see in a computer lab. (If you've seen the area with the world map from the intelligence room before, that's where we landed.)

"Who're you calling a 'miserable excuse' miss?" Jester spat in the general direction of the voice.

"You don't know who you're talking to boy. Now if you will be a good bunch of kids, you will come over here." 'Well, five minutes in and we're going to die. Peachy.' Seeing nothing else to do, we went over to the area the voice directed us to. (We got our weapons out too, we could be in danger.) The area was right in front of the large monitor, which was at present moment, showing a 'world map' (I say this since it looked slightly different- for one the individual borders weren't marked.) In front of the monitor, there was a huge control panel and a large chair.

"I bet you want to know what's going on don't you?" the voice asked us. We remained silent. It continued, "And put away those guns of yours, you know they won't hurt me." The person in the chair, the owner of the raspy, commanding voice, turned and faced us.

We got a nasty shock. The 'woman' in the chair looked more like a gargoyle than an actual person. Her hands were like gnarled talons, her face was really wrinkled and a pair of black eyes leered out. Her body was thin and stick-like. She looked like if I poked her with my little finger, she would snap in half. Her hair was grey and silvery, having suffered the rigours of age. The only thing that allowed us to figure out who she was, was the purple suit she was wearing, clinging to her spindly body.

The hag before us was none other than the Administrator.

"Stop staring at me and sit down." We obeyed. (We realised that if we pissed her off, it would mean certain death.) She continued with her 'speech'.

"Now, you kids," she pointed a finger at all of us, "Have been hired by us to work for Reliable Excavations and Demolitions. Which you know as RED. It's quite simple, even a toddler could understand it. You do what you do in that game you play, and you get paid. Easy." Gold decided to pipe up and ask a question. "But why us? Why not just get an adult to do it?" This sparked a mountain of questions from everyone else. (Hey, we wanted answers, so this was perfect.)

"When are we going home?"

"What was up with that message and test?"

"Do we get to respawn?" She waved her hand and we shut ourselves up. She then answered, "That is none of your concern. All you have to do is help in the war against Builder's League United. That's BLU to you. If you do that, you get paid and you can go home. Understand?" Sensing we had no other choice, we nodded. 'Why didn't she answer our questions? Is she hiding something?' The thought crossed my mind. The Administrator is a very conniving person-I wouldn't put it past her. I shook the thought off for now, there are more important things than wondering about elaborate schemes which may not exist.

"The first match is tomorrow. You are dismissed." All of us stood up and proceeded to leave. 'Well, that was easy.' I thought as I got up to leave. I thought that everything was going to be ok, until my relieved mood got ruined by a quip from the announcer. "Except you Joy, I need you to come over here."

'Aw, no. What did I do this time?' was the first thing to come to mind. Most likely a death sentence. I gulped, and turned around to address her. She pointed to a corridor, instructing, "Head to the place labelled the infirmary. You will be informed what to do." Nervously, I nodded and ran down the corridor to escape her steely gaze. Mentally reading the labels for the rooms, I ran until I reached the infirmary. (They must be really cocky-the room was really far down the corridor) I went ahead and entered the room.

"Ah, you must be RED's new medic. Come in and close the door behind you please." Inside the infirmary (which looked quite similar to the one back in the living quarters) I saw a man there. He was in his 30's to 40's and dressed in the same uniform as I was wearing. 'Did he take this post before I did?' I thought. He most likely wasn't a threat, according to the heads-up display, he was on my 'team'. (I could see his name, which was 'Wilbur', and health, so I assumed that he was friendly.) I closed the door and greeted him, simply saying, "Good afternoon Sir. What exactly was I called here for?"

"You need to do Uber transplants on the rest of your team right?" I nodded. "Well, I was told to teach you how to do it. Get over here and lay on the operating table here please. I'm going to have to demonstrate how to do it. By operating on you. No pressure." My first reaction was to gulp and make a break for the door. The senior medic was quicker and blocked the exit.

"Back up kid. I know what you're thinking. Something along the lines of 'This guy's going to kill me.' Right? Well, in case you didn't notice, I'm on your team. I couldn't kill you if I tried! Seriously, you don't trust someone on your own team?" 'And it's that sort of trust that ends up getting me killed by spies.' I thought. But, I didn't really have much of a choice. If I tried to escape, the Administrator would most likely kill me. Besides, I had no idea how to manage the transplants alone, and heck, if I could learn stuff, may as well. Worst case scenario: I end up with a faulty cardiac function and lose about 20 years off my lifespan. I decided to follow the older man's instructions.

"You know how to do a heart transplant right? Ok, so for this particular situation we don't have vasoconstrictor. So we'll have to cut the great veins while blood is still flowing through…This is only going to hurt a little bit ok?"

That's how it went- he explained how to do the transplant, operating on me as an example. (At least that got the hard part out of the way. What was I supposed to do? Operate on myself?) I stayed conscious and paid attention, one of the few times when a lesson from a 'teacher' didn't bore me to death.

"Alright you just flick this button on the medigun to seal up the patient and... there we are. Operation complete. Any questions?" I sat up on the operating table. 'Looks like I got out in one piece.' I thought, putting a hand over the area where a cut was a few seconds ago. I turned to the medic and told him, "Thanks Sir. You have no idea how much you've helped me." He smiled, and responded, "Call me Doc. Will. And you're welcome kid."

"Ok. Thanks Dr. Will." I waved him goodbye and went back to the living quarters. 'Why he decided to help me out, I don't know, but perhaps not everyone is out to kill me and my friends.' I thought as I hit the button to call the elevator.


	12. Chapter 11: Rising Storm

Chapter 11: Rising Storm

"Ok, just stay conscious a little longer. I'm almost done. And…operation complete." I told to ApekFreak as I finished sealing up the area I was operating on. Sure, it wasn't as clean a job as Dr. Will managed, but it could work. Probably.

"Ah. Thanks Joy." ApekFreak managed to get out those words before staggering off to the bathroom while clutching his abdomen. (Probably to vomit or something. I wouldn't blame him, he had to look at his own internal organs during the whole operation because there wasn't any way to knock him out.) Breathing a sigh of relief, I packed up the operation tools and crashed on my bed. 'Well, at least that's over and done with. Maybe I can get some sleep before the match today.' I curled up under the blanket on my bed, exhausted after doing eight straight operations on my friends.

I don't know if I was too tired to imagine anything too horrible, or my brain decided to have mercy on me, but I managed to sleep without having any nightmares. Which, of course, made it seem like it was only a few minutes after I got to bed when another announcement sounded over the intercom.

"All RED team members, please assemble at the 2fort spawn room immediately. The match will commence in 30 minutes." I groaned. I felt like laying under the sheets, like the announcement was just my mum shaking me out of bed on a Monday morning. 'This isn't school jackass. You're in 2fort. Now get yourself out of bed.' I thought to myself. I forced myself to get out of bed, get my glasses and head to the elevator.

"Hey, looks like Joy's finally here. You're late you know!" Fray yelled at me from the spawn room, where most of the team was assembled. I just waved him off. Most of the members who were already there decided to jack off, probably since they had nothing better to do. (Fray looked like the only one who was still paying attention.) Jester was playing a game of catch with Gold. (Which might've been rigged- the baseball kept hitting Gold's head) Cry decided to try and steal some matches from the resupply cupboard, but stopped when Ray spotted the act, and shook his head at him, causing Cry to slump in his seat with a muffled grumble.

Dusk and ApekFreak came up in the next elevator, both looking kind of sick. 'What? I'm pretty sure I didn't mess up the operation that badly.' Was my first thought. Then again, those two were pretty much scared of everything, so I couldn't really blame them for that. Fray was about to yell at them as well, but there was another announcement over the intercom.

"Mission begins in 5 minutes. Good luck." All of us (except for Fray who just laughed at us) scrambled to get ourselves ready. Most of us didn't notice the time passing. I quickly got out my medigun and started overhealing everyone. I tried whacking the dummies to get some charge to use later, but for some reason, it didn't work. (Perhaps it doesn't work on match days, but I wouldn't know.) I could see Cry look up and grab his flamethrower, Jester dropping his baseball and then scrambling to put it away, and ApekFreak, who straightened up and took out his sniper rifle.

"Mission begins in 30 seconds." By now, all of us had gotten ready. We stood, ready to begin the battle.

"5…4…3…2…1." The spawn room doors open and we all rushed out. (Except for Soul who turned invisible.) We excitedly ran out on to the bridge, hoping to meet the BLUs head-on.

What we did not expect, was that we might have met some of the people on BLU.

We stopped in our tracks at the bridge upon seeing some of our friends on the opposite team. Apparently they decided to charge on the bridge too. I could name all of the people there. I could see Axton, who was dressed exactly in the same way as Jester, if you didn't count the fact that his shirt was blue. There was Kaiju, who was almost the mirror image of Fray, and Taco, almost unrecognisable (like Cry) if it weren't for his teammates calling him so. Of course, this went on with Kaze, Storm, Cookie, Justin and Pie, who were the BLU counterparts of Ray, Dusk, Gold, me and Freak respectively.

The first thing everyone did: be confused. The only person not to be seen was the spy, who was missing for obvious reasons. Jester decided to go and call out to them, "Hey guys! Didn't know you landed here too!" Most of us were shocked silent. 'Is this some kind of joke?' I thought. It's one thing to hire people to fight in a war, and another to force them to kill their own friends.

Time seemed to stand still as we looked over our 'opponents'. Suddenly, the idea of fighting here became much, much less appealing. Jester tried walking up to the enemy team, as if to say hello, when the first shot rang out. He fell down, gripping his knee, which was oozing blood from the bullet hole. The offender just stood there, his pistol smoking. The first shot, the spark which caused more wounds than could ever be fixed, was fired by no one other than a 'friend', the BLU scout, Axton.


	13. Chapter 12: First Blood

Chapter 12: First Blood

We were all shocked- this sort of backstabbing only occurred in stories. And yet, we saw it right in front of our very eyes. (Even then it took us a while to process this) Jester, now recovered from the shock, glared at the person who shot him, angrily yelling, "What the f*** man! Why?!" Axton looked as shocked as we did, and kept his pistol, while slowly backing away.

Jester wouldn't take this lying down- he never would. He took out his scattergun, the same one with which he had killed thousands of online players with, and pulled the trigger. The crack of gunfire. And 'Axton' was now a dead corpse, riddled with shotgun pellets. And all the while, we stood by, petrified by the inability to understand, watching the horrific scene unfold.

"First Blood! Finally!" the Administrator exclaimed over the intercom. Yes, Axton was dead- we could see the kill feed. We were still stunned, still trying to process what was happening. I don't know what my friends were thinking, but I spent that time trying to search for some sort of justification- 'Axton shot first, so he'd die. Yeah, that could work. But death's a bit far for revenge isn't it?' I went through every logical explanation, trying to search for a reason. The only one which would fit without problems, was of course, the most depressing. We were at war.

Jester, unfazed by the fact that he had just committed murder, yelled at us, "WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU GUYS WAITING FOR?! LET'S SHOW THAT B*TCH A WAR!" and ran straight into the BLUs, his scattergun blazing. Our former friends started running, trying to avoid the stinging pellets. Some, like Taco and Kaze retaliated, with airblasts and grenades, but it only served to annoy Jester in his rampage of revenge.

I snapped back to reality. First thing that I registered was that Jester had just ran straight into a group of enemies which could very well kill him in one hit. 'You owe me big time for this!' I thought as I charged, in a futile attempt to prevent him from killing himself with his own stupidity.

Slowly, the others realised what was going on. Dusk ran in after he saw me go, followed by Fray, Ray, and Cry. Gold and ApekFreak ran off to do their own things. (I'm glad they did. They at least had the common sense to help where they could.) It is here that blood was shed, friendship was broken, and war began.

"Only one team is getting out alive, and it's going to be us!" Fray exclaimed, while running straight into the crowd where Dusk, Jester and I were already fighting. At the time, Jester was flying around like a bee, dodging left and right while firing his shotgun in the general direction of the enemy. I was busy healing both him and Dusk, so as to prevent them from dying. (Seriously, to this day, I am surprised that neither of them died under that much firepower.) Dusk was just spraying minigun rounds in an inaccurate manner due to the gun's recoil.

Fray ran into the crowd at point-blank and fired. The explosion knocked all of the BLU combatants and Fray backwards. Shrapnel flew everywhere, piercing Kaze, Storm, Taco and Fray, the latter of which took the most damage. Squeals of pain were heard. I ran over to Fray, who was lying face-up on the ground, body battered with metal shards and bleeding.

"Come on man! You should know better than doing something so stupid!" I swapped targets and started healing Fray. Meanwhile, Cry and Taco were duking it out in a flame war. Fire erupted left and right, setting many aflame. If you saw it, the first thing that would come to mind would probably be along the lines of 'W+M1 pyros'. They were more or less at a stalemate. That is, until Taco pulled out his shotgun. Upon seeing that, Cry airblasted Taco back and ran back to friendly territory.

By then, Fray was patched up, ready to go back into the thick of battle. He ran in hollering "You're going to get it!", and spammed rockets. This time, the BLUs were paying attention and scattered. Instead of killing anybody, the rockets scattered Kaze's stickies which he was using to keep us back. Ray took the opportunity to run in and launch grenades everywhere. His mistake.

"Ack!" Kaze panicked and hit the detonator, which turned Ray into giblets and did a number on himself. The glowing bombs on the ground, which were fired by Ray, rolled into Kaze and exploded, exacting his posthumous revenge.

'There's too many injured!' I thought, while panicking. I went to heal Cry, who was calling for help since he retreated. Suddenly, I heard an explosion behind me, followed by a jolt of pain rushing up my right arm.

"OW!" I dropped the medigun and checked my arm. There was a huge, jagged piece of metal lodged in it. Instinctively, I yanked it out and tried to continue. 'Ugh, this hurts like hell,' was what I thought, and my vision was going blurry from the pain. Still, I picked up the dropped medigun and attempted to do my job. I focused on healing Cry for a while, until he was well enough to go back into the bloodbath. Then, seeing as there wasn't anybody else who needed help on the outskirts, I ran in too.

Jester, who was still on a rage-fuelled rampage, had found a different way to get on the balcony. By jumping on Storm's head and onto the BLU sniper deck. He taunted, "Ha! Take that sons of b*tches! I'm going to take your Intel and there's nothing you can do-!" He was interrupted when he ran into Atlas, the BLU spy. His momentum caused both of them to be knocked down. Jester recovered first, looking around for what he ran into. Suddenly, an unseen force shoved him off the balcony and into the fighting below.

He landed face first, right next to Kaiju. The soldier turned around. Grinning, he fired at the downed scout. At point-blank range. With a crocket. The resulting explosion liquefied both teenagers. I cussed under my breath. 'I could've saved him!' I thought. Fray, after seeing two of his best friends die, started running in, firing rockets like crazy. I followed him, since he was one of the few alive.

"That's what you get for killing my friends you-!" He died screaming vengeance as Taco reflected one of his rockets back towards him. Cry ran in, setting people alight, as if hoping to burn them in his fury, but he too, was taken down, but not before killing his BLU counterpart. Now, it was only Dusk, me, Storm and Justin left alive.

'Even if I die here, Dusk must get out alive!'


	14. Chapter 13: The Last Stand

Chapter 13: The Last Stand

I heard Dusk let out a groan of pain. He was covered with shrapnel, bullets and burns. I could see him tearing a little from the pain, and I bet that he would have burst into tears right there and then, if he weren't staring down the barrel of Storm's gun. I wasn't much better. I had eaten my fair share of damage. Health regeneration wasn't doing much to ease the pain either. I latched on to Dusk, preparing for our last stand.

They advanced, a smug look written clearly on their faces, as if they were going to say, "Yeah, we're going to kick your arses, get our revenge, and there's nothing you can do about it." Except that we were going to die too quickly to hear them taunting us. Storm lowered his minigun, about to unleash bullet hell on both of us. Dusk stood defiant, lowering his gun, about to retaliate. Almost simultaneously, both boys started to fire.

"Joy! Just run! I can take them!" Dusk yelled over the gunfire. I shook my head.

"I'm not going to leave you alone with two people that can f***ing kill you! I don't care if you can respawn or not, I won't leave you to die!" I continued healing him through the bullet storm. After a few seconds of continuous fire, I was beginning to doubt that I could get him out alive. 'His health is going down faster than I can get it back up. I'm going to need a miracle to save him.'

Just as it seemed to me that all hope was lost, that this fight to save my brother's life was in vain, I heard a crackling sound. And then I remembered that I had a last card up my sleeve, the ace in the hole.

"Ubercharge ready! Eat lead jackasses!" I hit the button near the handle of the medigun. Instantly, I felt a huge rush of energy, like I could run up to Storm's smug face and punch him through the walls of the BLU base. Dusk was a bit confused, unsure of where the large amount of energy came from, but after a half-second, he started smiling and focused his fire on Storm.

"What the-!" Storm said when he saw my little brother become invulnerable. The confident expression on his face had disappeared, replaced by one of confusion and fear. And yet, he kept firing, his bullets ricocheting off of the red shell Dusk was encased in.

"Take that you idiot!" my little brother yelled as Storm fell. Just in time too, since the charge sputtered out about then. 'I did it. I saved him. We can both live.' I thought in relief. Now, there was only one thing left to do. Both of us went up to confront Justin. He was slowly backing up, gripping his crossbow in his trembling hands.

"Look man, I didn't want any of this! I'm not responsible for what Axton did! I didn't kill anybody!" He pleaded. Seeing no mercy, he fired at Dusk.

For once, his horrible aim did him some good.

Dusk dodged the syringe by ducking. Any guess where it ended up? It flew through the air, whizzing past my brother's head. It then pegged me in the thigh. I exclaimed in pain and collapsed. I tried yanking it out, but it was useless. It felt like liquid fire was flowing through my veins. After a while, the burning stopped, but the world was becoming dark. I was officially dying.

Dusk ran over, trying to see what wrong, concern clear in his eyes. Justin just stared, having dropped his crossbow in amazement. I worked up the strength to give my brother one last message, "Kill him already!" I then slumped over, the life having left my body. I was dead.

'Ugh, I'm deceased aren't I? Is this the afterlife?' I groaned and opened my eyes. I was lying face-down in a huge white area. I got up and looked around. The area was snow-white all around, the ground and sky stretching into forever. The only thing I could see there was a television set on the ground. For some reason, it looked a lot like the one I had back home. Curious, I sat down and looked at what was on-screen. What I saw was so heart-wrenchingly painful that it made dying seem like a prick with a needle.

My little brother was crying over my corpse on the television. I could only stare helplessly as my brother continued crying. I half wanted to shout at the television that I was right there, that he should go on without me, but I had a feeling that he wouldn't be able to hear what I said. All I could do, in order to satisfy my conscience, was mutter, "I'm sorry."

However, all of the sadness I felt evaporated when I saw what Justin was doing.

"Oh my god! You two are wimps!" He was pointing at Dusk and laughing. Yeah, I just died and our 'friend' was LAUGHING. Needless to say, I wanted to punch him in the gut. He started going on about how Dusk was a cry-baby, how he should run home to Mum. Dusk got up from his crying and started shouting at him.

"You don't know what it's like to have your sibling murdered! You'd never know you heartless b*stard!" He then proceeded to give Justin a sharp uppercut. Justin made a gurgling noise as he collapsed from the force of the punch. He too, was going to die. Dusk gave him a cold look, and proceeded to BLU spawn, on the way to get the Intelligence. Along the way, I could still see the tears in his eyes.

Suddenly, he grasped his chest. He started hyperventilating, like he was a fish out of water. I was staring at the television screen, wondering what was happening to him. He went pale, and collapsed, twitching and convulsing. He made the same noise as Justin did. 'He can't be dying. He seriously can't be dead after I saved him. He's supposed to get away, to go home and live his life. He isn't supposed to collapse twitching on the ground!' I thought. But there he was, flailing in a fit that could be a heart attack or asphyxiation.

And then, the world became dark again, just as Dusk's body convulsed one last time.

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I'm back guys! I survived the apocalypse and I can write, so updates will go back to normal. Again, thank you for reading my story, please review if you can, constructive criticism is always appreciated, and I'l see you guys next week. (Or earlier. There's no telling during the holidays.)


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